Header image: KF in Dall-E
- Now, for the first time in his history, man can perceive that the idea of the unity of the human race and the conquest of nature for the sake of man is no longer a dream but a realistic possibility. Is he not justified in being proud and in having confidence in himself and in the future of mankind? KF: the conquering of nature – achieved in the short-term; long term, we will reap what we sow – nothing.
- Man is the only animal that can be bored, that can be discontented, that can feel evicted from paradise. Man is the only animal for whom his own existence is a problem which he has to solve and from which he cannot escape.
- It is one of the peculiar qualities of the human mind that, when confronted with a contradiction, it cannot remain passive. It is set in motion with the aim of resolving the contradiction. All human progress is due to this fact.
- Like the handbag, one has to be in fashion on the personality market, and in order to be in fashion one has to know what kind of personality is most in demand…The pictorial magazines, newspapers, and newsreels show the pictures and life stories of the successful in many variations.
- Since modern man experiences himself both as the seller and as the commodity to be sold on the market, his self-esteem depends on conditions beyond his control…The degree of insecurity which results from this orientation can hardly be overestimated. If one feels that one’s own value is not constituted primarily by the human qualities one possesses, but by one’s success on a competitive market with ever-changing conditions, one’s self-esteem is bound to be shaky and in constant need of confirmation by others. Hence one is driven to strive relentlessly for success, and any setback is a severe threat to one’s self-esteem; helplessness, insecurity, and inferiority feelings are the result. If the vicissitudes of the market are the judges of one’s value, the sense of dignity and pride is destroyed.
- [70] success depends largely on how one sells one’s personality, one experiences oneself as a commodity or rather simultaneously as the seller and the commodity to be sold.
- [72] But the problem is not only that of self-evaluation and self-esteem but of one’s experience of oneself as an independent entity, of one’s identity with oneself….”I am as you desire me.”
- Their individuality, that which is peculiar and unique in them, is valueless and, in fact, a ballast.
- We find today a tremendous enthusiasm for knowledge and education, but at the same time a skeptical or contemptuous attitude toward the allegedly impractical and useless thinking which is concerned “only” with the truth and which has no exchange value on the market.
- The marketing orientation does not come out of the eighteenth or nineteenth centuries; it is definitely a modern product.
4· Faith as a Character Trait
- Then the fight against faith was a fight for emancipation from spiritual shackles; it was a fight against irrational belief, the expression of faith in man’s reason and his ability to establish a social order governed by the principles of freedom, equality, and brotherliness. Today the lack of faith is the expression of profound confusion and despair.
- considering faith to be a basic attitude of a person, a character trait which pervades all his experiences, which enables a man to face reality without illusions and yet to live by his faith.
- It may be helpful to remember that the term “faith” as it is used in the Old Testament- “Emunah“- means “firmness” and thereby denotes a certain quality of human experience, a character trait, rather than the content of a belief in something.
- rational / irrational doubt (existential angst / general helplessness)
- In contrast to irrational doubt, rational doubt questions assumptions the validity of which depends on belief in an authority and not on one’s own experience. This doubt has an important function in personality development (child to adult re parents)
- By irrational faith I understand the belief in a person, idea, or symbol which does not result from one’s own experience of thought or feeling, but which is based on one’s emotional submission to irrational authority…
- the connection between submission and intellectual and emotional processes (hypnosis; hitler; – they accept his ideas because they have submitted to his authority in a semi hypnotic fashion – hitler holding propaganda meetings at night)
- For irrational faith, the sentence “Credo quia absurdum est” 65-“l believe because it is absurd”…he has transcended the faculty of common sense and thus has a magic power which puts him above the average person. [KF: anti-vaccers; conspiracy theorists]
- Irrational faith is a fanatic conviction in somebody or something, rooted in submission to a personal or impersonal irrational authority. Rational faith, in contrast, is a firm conviction based on productive intellectual and emotional activity.
- At every step from the conception of a rational vision to the formulation of a theory, faith is necessary: faith in the vision as a rationally valid aim to pursue, faith in the hypothesis as a likely and plausible proposition, and faith in the final theory, at least until a general consensus about its validity has been reached. This faith is rooted in one’s own experience, in the confidence in one’s power of thought, observation, and judgment.
- conviction based upon one’s own productive observing and thinking.
- Trust ~ “Having faith” in another person
- In the same sense we have faith in ourselves. It is this core which is the reality behind the word “I” and on which our conviction of our own identity is based.
- Only the person who has faith in himself is able to be faithful to others because only he can be sure that he will be the same at a future time as he is today and, therefore, to feel and to act as he now expects to.
- Faith as optimism, hopefulness, a tomorrow,
- The presence of this faith makes the difference between education and manipulation. Education is identical with helping the child realize his potentialities. 66 The opposite of education is manipulation, which is based on the absence of faith in the growth of potentialities and on the conviction that a child will be right only if the adults put into him what is desirable and cut off what seems to be undesirable. There is no need of faith in the robot since there is no life in it either.
- ‘mankind’: the idea that the potentialities of man are such that given the proper conditions they will be capable of building a social order governed by the principles of equality, justice, and love.
- There is no rational faith in power. There is submission to it or, on the part of those who have it, the wish to keep it. While to many power seems to be the most real of all things, the history of man has proved it to be the most unstable of all human achievements. Because of the fact that faith and power are mutually exclusive, all religions and political systems which originally are built on rational faith become corrupt and eventually lose what strength they have if they rely on power or even ally themselves with it.
- Inasmuch as rational faith is rooted in the experience of one’s own productiveness, it cannot be passive but must be the expression of genuine inner activity.
- The ideas of freedom or democracy deteriorate into nothing but irrational faith once they are not based upon the productive experience of each individual but are presented to him by parties or states which force him to believe in these ideas. [KF: a collective lack of faith] Man cannot live without faith. The crucial question for our own generation and the next ones is whether this faith will be an irrational faith in leaders, machines, success, or the rational faith in man based on the experience of our own productive activity.
5 The Moral Powers in Man
- The paralyzing effect of power does not rest only upon the fear it arouses, but equally on an implicit promise-the promise that those in possession of power can protect and take care of the “weak” who submit to it, that they can free man from the burden of uncertainty and of responsibility for himself by guaranteeing order and by assigning the individual a place in this order which makes him feel secure.
- Man’s submission to this combination of threat and promise is his real “fall.” By submitting to power = domi· nation he loses his power = potency.
Our moral problem is man’s indifference to himself. It lies in the fact that we have lost the sense of the significance and uniqueness of the individual, that we have made ourselves into instruments for purposes outside ourselves, that we experience and treat ourselves as commodities, and that our own powers have become alienated from ourselves. We have become things and our neighbors have become things.